1. "Career freedom means starting a business. " Clients often assume they can reach career freedom only by starting a business. I know dozens of people who feel very free in a corporate setting. They swim easily in corporate stream and learn to balance their lives. Some even return after successful entrepreneurial ventures.

2. "Don't worry, be happy." Some advisors tell you, "You'll be great," even if they secretly believe you're following a harebrained path that is doomed to fail. Do your own research and get second and third opinions.

3. "Visualize success." While I support visualizing and attracting, I do not believe you can attract business from a non-existent target market. Better to attract prosperity and fulfillment. You might also try to attract knowledge and discernment so you can evaluate your various advisors.

4. "If you can dream it, you can do it." In her wonderful book, Finding your own north star, Martha Beck debunks this myth with a simple example: She once dreamed she found herself in a bathtub with ex-President Clinton and an owl. Other people dream of meeting Queen of England or connecting with people who lived ten centuries ago.

The reverse is often true: "You must be able to imagine yourself successful in order to reach your goals." Still, I know people who were catapulted to success far beyond their dreams; they missed ride but managed to enjoy their arrival.

In 1634, tulip bulbs were traded in a special exchange in Amsterdam. People used these bulbs as means of exchange and value store. They traded them and speculated in them. The rare black tulip bulbs were as valuable as a big mansion house. The craze lasted four years and it seemed that it would last forever. But this was not to be.

The bubble burst in 1637. In a matter of a few days, price of tulip bulbs was slashed by 96%!

This specific pyramid investment scheme was somewhat different from ones which were to follow it in human financial history elsewhere in world. It had no "organizing committee", no identifiable group of movers and shakers, which controlled and directed it. Also, no explicit promises were ever made concerning profits which investors could expect from participating in scheme - or even that profits were forthcoming to them.

Since then, pyramid schemes have evolved into intricate psychological ploys.

Modern ones have a few characteristics in common:

First, they involve ever growing numbers of people. They mushroom exponentially into proportions that usually threaten national economy and very fabric of society. All of them have grave political and social implications.

Hundreds of thousands of investors (in a population of less than 3.5 million souls) were deeply enmeshed in 1983 banking crisis in Israel.

This was a classic pyramid scheme: banks offered their own shares for sale, promising investors that price of shares will only go up (sometimes by 2% daily). The banks used depositors' money, their capital, their profits and money that they borrowed abroad to keep this impossible and unhealthy promise. Everyone knew what was going on and everyone was involved.

The Ministers of Finance, Governors of Central Bank assisted banks in these criminal pursuits. This specific pyramid scheme - arguably, longest in history - lasted 7 years.

On one day in October 1983, ALL banks in Israel collapsed. The government faced such civil unrest that it was forced to compensate shareholders through an elaborate share buyback plan which lasted 9 years. The total indirect damage is hard to evaluate, but direct damage amounted to 6 billion USD.

This specific incident highlights another important attribute of pyramid schemes: investors are promised impossibly high yields, either by way of profits or by way of interest paid. Such yields cannot be derived from proper investment of funds - so, organizers resort to dirty tricks.

They use new money, invested by new investors - to pay off old investors.

The religion of Islam forbids lenders to charge interest on credits that they provide. This prohibition is problematic in modern day life and could bring modern finance to a complete halt.

It was against this backdrop, that a few entrepreneurs and religious figures in Egypt and in Pakistan established what they called: "Islamic banks". These banks refrained from either paying interest to depositors - or from charging their clients interest on loans that they doled out. Instead, they have made their depositors partners in fictitious profits - and have charged their clients for fictitious losses. All would have been well had Islamic banks stuck to healthier business practices.

But they offer impossibly high "profits" and ended way every pyramid ends: they collapsed and dragged economies and political establishments with them.

The latest example of price paid by whole nations due to failed pyramid schemes is, of course, Albania 1997. One third of population was heavily involved in a series of heavily leveraged investment plans which collapsed almost simultaneously. Inept political and financial crisis management led Albania to verge of disintegration into civil war.

But why must pyramid schemes fail? Why can't they continue forever, riding on back of new money and keeping every investor happy, new and old?

The reason is that number of new investors - and, therefore, amount of new money available to pyramid's organizers - is limited. There are just so many risk takers. The day of judgement is heralded by an ominous mismatch between overblown obligations and trickling down of new money. When there is no more money available to pay off old investors, panic ensues. Everyone wants to draw money at same time. This, evidently, is never possible - some of money is usually invested in real estate or was provided as a loan. Even most stable and healthiest financial institutions never put aside more than 10% of money deposited with them.

Thus, pyramids are doomed to collapse.

But, then, most of investors in pyramids know that pyramids are scams, not schemes. They stand warned by collapse of other pyramid schemes, sometimes in same place and at same time. Still, they are attracted again and again as butterflies are to fire and with same results.

The reason is as old as human psychology: greed, avarice. The organizers promise investors two things:

That they could draw their money anytime that they want to, and That in meantime, they will be able to continue to receive high returns on their money. People know that this is highly improbable and that likelihood that they will lose all or part of their money grows with time. But they convince themselves that high profits or interest payments that they will be able to collect before pyramid collapses - will more than amply compensate them for loss of their money. Some of them, hope to succeed in drawing money before imminent collapse, based on "warning signs". In other words, investors believe that they can outwit organizers of pyramid. The investors collaborate with organizers on psychological level: cheated and deceiver engage in a delicate ballet leading to their mutual downfall.